Cafe Marie-Jeanne, run by husband-wife partners Michael Simmons (chef) and Val Szafranski (front of house), is, Simmons says, "the very definition of a mom-and-pop; except neither one of us is a mom or pop." But "mom-and-pop," or some young and modern iteration thereof, fits the restaurant reasonably...

Phil Vettel

When it comes to Harvest Room, an ambitious 2-year-old restaurant in southwest suburban Palos Heights, chef Jonathan Harootunian is pulling out some of the stops. "Nobody (nearby) is doing these kinds of things," he says of his most creative impulses. "But I'm also cognizant that I have to keep...

Anyone who has followed my dispatches for any length of time knows that I like duck any way I can get it. Bright-pink roasted breast meat, slow-cooked Czech-style duck, duck confit — and don't get me started on foie gras — I love it all. But no cooking style delivers the combination of succulent...

In 2005, just about every top food writer in America visited Chicago, and three chefs drew them here. First, of course, was Grant Achatz, whose restaurant, Alinea, was inspiring cover stories even before it opened in May that year. But writers also stopped into Avenues, where Graham Elliot Bowles...

JeanMarie Brownson

Friends sometimes apologize to me for being strictly meat and potatoes lovers. No problem. I enjoy cooking both. Offering a flavorful finishing sauce proves key to pleasing everyone. I turn to the brilliance of Argentina’s meat and robust condiment culture for inspiration. Argentina’s love of beef...

Friends sometimes apologize to me for being strictly meat and potatoes lovers. No problem. I enjoy cooking both. Offering a flavorful finishing sauce proves key to pleasing everyone. I turn to the brilliance of Argentina’s meat and robust condiment culture for inspiration. Argentina’s love of beef...

My cycling instructor resolves to only buy what she truly loves so she buys less. I posit that if you cook what you truly love, you will enjoy the process more. Take cassoulet for example. I adore this humble French casserole. Full of toothsome white beans, sausages, pork, lamb and duck, topped...

Leah Eskin

The first recipe I published was a fail. I was writing a weekly column for the Chicago Tribune Sunday magazine — not a food column, more of a ruminative ramble — and, after the World Trade Center crumbled, I tacked on a recipe for calm: chocolate-chip cookies. I made cookies regularly, ritually,...

The first recipe I published was a fail. I was writing a weekly column for the Chicago Tribune Sunday magazine — not a food column, more of a ruminative ramble — and, after the World Trade Center crumbled, I tacked on a recipe for calm: chocolate-chip cookies. I made cookies regularly, ritually,...

American pie is a sweet tradition — apple, pumpkin, chocolate. But in Britain, pie is baked up savory — pork, duck, chicken, pigeon, sausage, pork. And how. Meat pie is packed right to the ridges — no slick sauce or crisp carrot distraction. Heated, plunked on a pool of mashed potatoes and doused...

Kevin Pang

If there's an heir apparent to Charlie Trotter, might that person be Rick Bayless? What I mean is a chef figurehead whose underlings went on to become stars on their own. Paul Kahan came from Bayless' kitchen. Anselmo Ramirez, a longtime line cook at Frontera Grill and Topolobampo, is making waves...

Are you making the most of your sausage? Chances are, you're not. You're likely just scratching your andouille surface, not living up your knackwurst potential, going through life not up to your best chorizo self. Your sai krok Isaan can do better, friend. If you feel your tubed meat quotient...

The slate of 2015 nominees for the Jean Banchet Awards, the annual ceremony honoring Chicago-area chefs, beverage professionals and restaurants, has been announced. Among the marquee categories are restaurant of the year, in which the four finalists are EL Ideas, Fat Rice, Intro and Parachute....

Bill Daley

Coffee seemed so simple when I was a kid in the 1960s. All the grown-ups seemed to need was a kettle of boiling water, a spoonful or two of instant coffee, a little sugar, some half-and-half and a pack of Parliament cigarettes. Today, the household air is markedly cleaner without the smokes, but...

It was a chance conversation with a journalism school professor that impelled Robert W. Fieseler to search out the story of a long-ago and largely — and in many cases, willfully — forgotten fire in a New Orleans gay bar that killed 32 people. That professor had been what Fieseler called a “baby...

It was a chance conversation with a journalism school professor that impelled Robert W. Fieseler to search out the story of a long-ago and largely — and in many cases, willfully — forgotten fire in a New Orleans gay bar that killed 32 people. That professor had been what Fieseler called a “baby...

James P. DeWan

Although it helps, you needn’t be an utter crackpot to believe that the prehistoric artworks adorning the caves of Western Europe are actually primitive menus. Sadly, though, those chef’s degustations at Thakk’s of Grobnork left much to be desired, as the peeps of the Pleistocene knew little and...

Here’s a thought: if the heart is the symbolic representation of Valentine’s Day, instead of serving our lovers chocolate on that ballyhooed holiday of love, perhaps we should be feeding them organ meats. No? Chocolate it is, then. But, can we at least shed that tired old “sweets for the sweet”...

Here’s a thought: if the heart is the symbolic representation of Valentine’s Day, instead of serving our lovers chocolate on that ballyhooed holiday of love, perhaps we should be feeding them organ meats. No? Chocolate it is, then. But, can we at least shed that tired old “sweets for the sweet”...

Bill St. John

Pasta is pretty easy to pair with wine; any starch is. It's what's on top that matters to the match. This dish sports cooked-down mushrooms, which contain a lot of the "fifth" taste called umami (a savory, salivating taste first isolated by the Japanese). Other high-umami foods: Parmigiano-Reggiano,...

You could enjoy these tidbits right from the oven, or also at room or ambient temperature — at a picnic, say. In any event, the wine should be crisp and refreshing; you need especially to squeegee away the salt and fat of cheese and egg. If the wine is red, it would be great if it were slightly...

A fair amount of sweetness in this grilled shrimp recipe (honey, of course, but also the "sweet" meat of shellfish) suggests a wine choice with a bit of residual sugar — an off-dry riesling, perhaps. As much as many folk eschew wines with sweetness — it's perhaps the most common wine dis — sweet...